


Between the Lines

by HeartlessAngel



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: M/M, Oblivious Noctis, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-05
Updated: 2017-12-05
Packaged: 2019-02-11 00:16:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12923223
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HeartlessAngel/pseuds/HeartlessAngel
Summary: His feelings can only ever exist as subtext and there’s only one way he can deal with that.





	Between the Lines

* * *

Gladio leaned over the table carefully to not upset any of his newly gained bruises. His right forearm was in a brace again after a week or so without one, his knuckles purplish. He held a finger to the open book like he knew every line by heart.

“Just reading it and taking it all at face value means you’ll miss out on lots of stuff that’s going on. Look at this passage here,” Gladio tapped at the page.

He wrinkled his nose and held his breath in for a second like he was about to sneeze, but, to his relief, the sneeze was lost somewhere. Someone had clocked him right in the middle of his face and he looked utterly ridiculous with a white band-aid across the bridge of his nose and a split lower lip.

“What, so he loved her all along then?” Noctis asked, dumbfounded. “Why didn’t he say something? That’d save them a whole lot of grief, me included.”

“Do you always speak your mind?”

“N-no, but I’m not a character in a book. Not everything I do has to move the story the forward. He just, suffered. For nothing.”

Gladio sat back and rubbed his forehead so his cap fell back and onto the floor and revealed yet another ugly bruise right on his hairline. Only Gladio and the Astrals knew if he was purple all over. Noctis would ask him about it, but the only answer he ever got was that it was from practice. With a speeding truck, by the looks of it.

“Read the book again. It basically spells it out for you. It’s not exactly the epitome of subtlety, that one.”

Noctis fiddled with the corner of the pages until Gladio moved his hand away from the book as if it had been pleading for help.

Gladio tutored him in literature, highbrow, lowbrow and everything in between. A future King must have a decent vocabulary and enough knowledge of the arts to hold conversations of just about anything. There was such a conversation pending now, one related to this particular book of tragic almost-lovers who allowed happiness to escape them by sheer stubbornness and a willingness for sacrifice that had caused Noctis nightmares.

“You know how the main character, how Charles, started to write love letters?”

“Yeah…?” Gladio fidgeted in his chair and clasped his hands at his front as if on guard.

“Have you ever written any?” Noctis asked.

Noctis looked down on the book, his bangs barely covering his forehead thanks to school regulations. Even seniors were bound by these regulations on appearance, which made his creeping blush all the more visible.

“On occasion,” Gladio said, reluctantly. “It, it’s not like an everyday thing, just, you know, when there’s a reason for it - when, you know,” Gladio gestured an arch from his chest like showing where foodstuff would fly out on a successful Heimlich maneuver.

“Who have you given them to? Anyone I know?” Noctis gaped.

“I haven’t really, actually given them away, physically. I mean, I did, a few of them, I did, but… yeah - anyway, what brought this on?” Gladio cleared his throat and tried to find a comfortable place to put his hands.

It must have been someone really special to prompt Gladio to write a love letter of all things. He had never struck Noctis as the romantic kind, not love letter romantic, maybe a text, a quick ‘btb’ to his girlfriends whenever he needed to take care of business.

On any other occasion, Noctis would’ve tried to get it out of him, by Royal Decree if need be, but there was a pressing matter at hand that could not wait.

“I was wondering if you could help me write one. I tried doing it myself, searched for poems online, tried to _write_ poems, but then I read through what I’d written and it’s just,” Noctis hung his head. “So god damn embarrassing.”

Gladio laughed.

“Is it a writing exercise for school? Do you have to read it out loud?” Gladio teased and nudged Noctis under the table with his feet.

Noctis shook his head.

“It’s for Luna…”

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

They fell silent. Gladio frowned for a split second, confused perhaps, or maybe it was a lousy attempt to keep from laughing at what Noctis could only assume to be his beet red face.

“I didn’t know that, uh, that you were getting serious. Ignis said you weren’t. Just friends. Is what he said…”

“It’s not serious. Not yet. I hope that maybe it could be someday. If she feels the same. Gotta give it a try, right? To not end up like Charles, with a bunch of unsent letters.” Noctis chuckled and Gladio mirrored him, except he didn’t look up at Noctis, much too preoccupied with the velcro strap tabs on the brace.

“Yeah, that would suck big time,” Gladio agreed.

“So, can you help me? Please? I’d be forever grateful.” Noctis clasped his hands in a plea.

“Wow, please _and_ thanks. You’re not messing around, huh?” Gladio flashed him a lopsided smile to mind the bruise on his jaw. “Alright, let’s do it. Let young love flourish and whatnot.”

Noctis ran into his bedroom to get his trove of drafts, notebooks, pens and stickers. At the top of it, The Notebook, bound in blue-colored leather, decorated with gold.

Gladio read through the drafts in silence, armed with nothing but a pen to make annotations. A few drafts later, when Noctis started to ask questions impatiently, he found a clean sheet of paper.

“You’re too straight to the point,” Gladio said. “It’s not necessarily a bad thing. The Gods know you could use some of that in face-to-face interactions. But for love letters, if you want them to read as poems, you’ve gotta paint pictures.”

“I might be worse at drawing than writing, Gladio,” Noctis said and crossed his arms with concern for his plans.

“Just start simple,” Gladio began, attention solely on the sheet of paper in front of him. “What do you feel when, when you think of her?”

“Lots.”

Gladio rolled the pen between his fingers fast enough for it to become a blur. He leaned against the table and propped his head on one hand.

“Not a day goes by without me rising to the image of you etched within my heart and mind. You’re the sun in the morning, the moon at night, the light that warms me when I’m cold, the light that guides me when it’s dark. You’re the past that made me, the present that holds me, the future I yearn for…”

Noctis tried to look over Gladio’s shoulder, eyes wide with wonder.

“Are you writing this down? It’s gold! Gladio, that’s… it’s like you just, ripped my chest open and saw the mess of words floating around in there…!”

“That so?”

“Yeah! Was that just off the top of your head? Or is this one of your old love letters?”

“Bit of column A, bit of column B.”

Gladio scribbled down notes on the empty sheet of paper, his handwriting as eloquent as what Noctis just heard.

“Listen, I’ve gotta go,” Gladio got up as soon as he finished.

“Go where? Aren’t you staying for dinner? Ignis is cooking.”

“No, I’ve really gotta go - I forgot I’ve got this important thing.”

“What important thing?” Noctis followed Gladio to the foyer.

“Practice.”

“On a Sunday?”

“Part of the job.”

“Since when?”

“Since forever.”

Gladio put on his jacket while wiggling his feet into his sneakers. “Should I leave the door downstairs open for the dog?”

“No, I’ll go down when I’m done....” Noctis said and leaned against the wall. “Can’t you get an exempt or something to not have to practice today? What are you even gonna do? Martial arts?”

“What are you worried about? I got you started, you just write what you gotta write and I’ll be out of your hair.”

“Yeah, that’s not my hang-up, Gladio.”

“What is it then?”

Noctis gestured to all of him, frustrated by Gladio not seeing the obvious.

“I don’t know if you’ve taken a look in the mirror lately, but you look like you’ve been in a four-way car accident - and come to think of it, you didn’t have that brace on the other day at the arcade, have you even had a doctor take a look at that?”

“First of all, the brace is nothing. Just a precaution. Second of all, you should see the other guy.”

“What, is he dead?”

“I hope not.”

The comment was said with such earnest that Noctis froze and stared, hoping for the confirmation that Gladio was joking. It did come. Off-beat, as a second thought.

“Go write that letter, loverboy. I’ll see you around.”


End file.
